So you've created a great family tree website. Now what? It's time to get the word out. Over the last year, I've spent a lot of time doing this for the Pratt Family website and have been fairly successful as traffic is almost 10 times what it was a year ago!
1. Word of mouth. Of course, tell everyone in your family. Mention it in e-mails, family newsletters, and conversations. This part is obvious--the problem is most families stop here.
2. Pay-per-click. Your first thought was probably the same as mine--"I don't have money to pay to tell people about my genealogy website." That's ok, neither did I. At Microsoft AdCenter, you can get $50 free marketing--at 10 cents a click, that could translate into 500 clicks! Now, Microsoft does charge you a non-refundable $5 fee. 500 visitors for $5--is it worth it to you. Yahoo does the same thing--$100 for free and they charge you $5. Could be 1000 clicks for $5. Disclaimer: Be sure to read the fine print--they change the rules on these occasionally and I haven't used either in some time. Be sure to cancel once your free credit is used up or if they will start charging you per click.
To pick your "keywords" for your PPC, be creative. Of course, cover the basics. Using Pratt as an example, perhaps your keywords could be "pratt, pratt family, pratt genealogy, pratt family, pratt website, pratt newsletter, pratt family association, pratt family organization." I took the time and actually added the names for the top 100 most interesting and well-known people in my family line as keywords. Also, what other categories does your family fall into? For example, I also had keywords like "utah pioneers" and"early mormons."
3. Directories. I spent a lot of time submitting our website to free directories (there are literally thousands of them). We've seen very little traffic from most of them. However, there are a few genealogy directories out there that are worth looking into such as the Open Directory Project, Yahoo's Directory, All Genealogy Sites, Cyndi's List, and All Surnames to name a few.
4. Message Boards. Genforum has message boards for thousands of surnames--find a few that relate to your genealogy and post a message with a link to your family tree site.
5. Natural Search Engines. It's worth the time to create a sitemap and submit it to Google. There has been a lot written about this elsewhere so I won't focus on here. Simply, the best way to get better rankings in the search engines is to have good content on your family tree website. In other words, simply uploading a GEDCOM with lots of names and dates won't get you there--add original content that provides value.
6. Links. Search for websites that have a relationship to yours. Maybe they focus on the same surname or ancestor or have other ties to your family history. Ask them to consider linking to your family tree website. This will help build your traffic and will increase your search engine rankings.
Best of luck! I'd be happy to talk specifics with you about your website if you leave a comment or shoot me an e-mail.
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